Rantor, founding member of the International League of Luddites, headquartered in South Austin, Texas 78704, celebrates National Indignation Week every day of the year.

Saturday, September 27, 2003

Passion flowers!

Five years ago we planted a few seeds of passion vine bought through the mail from Park. They took a long time to germinate. The first three years, the gulf fritillary larvae pretty much ate them back to the roots. What was left died back during the winter. Last year they grew so prolifically that they weren't eaten back. Today, we saw our first flower! Here's another view. And another, showing a big, fat bud as well. These are just like ours, and it appears that we'll have at least four. We'd given up on ever having blooms, but reading around on the web makes a person believe that we've been lucky. Evidently, passiflora cerulea grown from seed often does not ever bloom at all. The fragrance is strong, but not unpleasant. Now that we've been awestruck by the flower, maybe we'll be privileged to see fruit (maypops), too. We bought the seeds because we saw the flowers growing up the side of McPhail's Florist on Barton Springs, but theirs were a different color and variety, it turns out. Not that we're at all disappointed!